One morning, the patient had a coughing fit in the shower, but he didn’t think much of it. When he got out of the shower, the 72-year-old retired engineer attempted to insert a contact lens into his right eye. He hadn’t worn the lens for eight months, and he immediately noticed that it felt uncomfortable and threw it away. When he carefully inspected his eye in the mirror, he noticed a white line along the inferior aspect of his iris. He thought this was odd and made an appointment to see us two days later.

Faced with competing priorities, Congress has been willing to fund everything that seemed deserving. Those free-spending days are coming to an end, and when they do, the proposals supported by the best data and the best lobbying efforts will have an advantage.

Although ophthalmology and the patients we serve have excellent lobbying on our behalf, our advocates need solid data to show that vision care and research are good investments of public funds.

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Share your thoughts with your colleagues by sending a letter to eyenet@aao.org.